The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Politics (273 page)
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Authors: Iain McLean
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Taylorism
television and politics
The BBC opened a television service for the London area in 1936, first broadcasting from Alexandra Palace on 2 November. However, the development of television in the United Kingdom was considerably set back by the Second World War; when the service resumed in 1946 there were fewer than 12,000 sets. However, by 1960 an overwhelming majority of households had sets in the United Kingdom and the United States. The proportion was fewer in other parts of the world; the 2 million sets in West Germany and 1.5 million in France have to be compared with 10 million in the United Kingdom at that time. But access to television was certainly greater than those figures suggest as many people could see television in such institutions as bars and schools.
Widespread access to a medium which could accurately communicate both sounds and images must be assumed to have a considerable effect on political relations. For example, in democratic theory, at least some of the orthodox idea of a representative's role becomes irrelevant in circumstances in which national leaders can be seen or heard in nearly everybody's living room. The early period of mass television did produce observations of ‘Caesarist’ or ‘Bonapartist’ tendencies as politicians sought a direct relationship with the electorate. Harold Macmillan (British Prime Minister 1957–63), Charles De Gaulle (French President 1958–68), and John Kennedy (US President 1960–3) were all national leaders thought to have succeeded by adapting to the ‘television age’. Many people believed that Kennedy had won his narrow victory over Richard Nixon in 1960 because his ‘clean cut’ image in television debate compared favourably with Nixon's ‘five o'clock shadow’.
However, any attempt to assess accurately the effects of television on politics faces all the classic problems of explanation in the social sciences: there are a huge number of ‘inputs’ and ‘outputs’, millions of people who watch television and perform actions, in a context which is changing rapidly in other respects. It is not possible to find indubitable relations between cause and effect; these philosophical problems constrain research and debate about many social issues, including others involving television, such as the question of whether fictional television violence encourages real criminal violence. Such problems do not, however, inhibit self-appointed experts and some politicians from ‘knowing’ the nature of these links.
Early liberal fears of totalitarianism, such as those expressed by
Russell
and
Orwell
, tended to assume that television would prove a mighty mechanism for thought control by the established powers. But much research suggested that most people formed the core of their beliefs and values at an early stage of their lives through family influences and were capable of treating television very selectively, paying close attention only to ideas and evidence which confirmed their existing views. Counter-arguments have suggested that television is more important than this because it does tend to structure images, agendas, and beliefs in various ways, and that those ways function generally to support acceptance of the
status quo
.
In most countries in 1960, of ten households watching television at least six were likely to be watching the same thing. By 1990, there were not only more ‘terrestrial’ channels, but additional options transmitted by cable and satellite. Televisions could also be used for interactive games and as sources of written information. Above all, people could watch video tapes which they themselves chose and controlled. Of ten households watching a television screen it was very possible that all ten should be watching something different. These technical developments changed the context of television and power, and downgraded debates about whether legislatures should be televised since so few people were likely to watch them.
Widespread access to a medium which could accurately communicate both sounds and images must be assumed to have a considerable effect on political relations. For example, in democratic theory, at least some of the orthodox idea of a representative's role becomes irrelevant in circumstances in which national leaders can be seen or heard in nearly everybody's living room. The early period of mass television did produce observations of ‘Caesarist’ or ‘Bonapartist’ tendencies as politicians sought a direct relationship with the electorate. Harold Macmillan (British Prime Minister 1957–63), Charles De Gaulle (French President 1958–68), and John Kennedy (US President 1960–3) were all national leaders thought to have succeeded by adapting to the ‘television age’. Many people believed that Kennedy had won his narrow victory over Richard Nixon in 1960 because his ‘clean cut’ image in television debate compared favourably with Nixon's ‘five o'clock shadow’.
However, any attempt to assess accurately the effects of television on politics faces all the classic problems of explanation in the social sciences: there are a huge number of ‘inputs’ and ‘outputs’, millions of people who watch television and perform actions, in a context which is changing rapidly in other respects. It is not possible to find indubitable relations between cause and effect; these philosophical problems constrain research and debate about many social issues, including others involving television, such as the question of whether fictional television violence encourages real criminal violence. Such problems do not, however, inhibit self-appointed experts and some politicians from ‘knowing’ the nature of these links.
Early liberal fears of totalitarianism, such as those expressed by
Russell
and
Orwell
, tended to assume that television would prove a mighty mechanism for thought control by the established powers. But much research suggested that most people formed the core of their beliefs and values at an early stage of their lives through family influences and were capable of treating television very selectively, paying close attention only to ideas and evidence which confirmed their existing views. Counter-arguments have suggested that television is more important than this because it does tend to structure images, agendas, and beliefs in various ways, and that those ways function generally to support acceptance of the
status quo
.
In most countries in 1960, of ten households watching television at least six were likely to be watching the same thing. By 1990, there were not only more ‘terrestrial’ channels, but additional options transmitted by cable and satellite. Televisions could also be used for interactive games and as sources of written information. Above all, people could watch video tapes which they themselves chose and controlled. Of ten households watching a television screen it was very possible that all ten should be watching something different. These technical developments changed the context of television and power, and downgraded debates about whether legislatures should be televised since so few people were likely to watch them.
Tenth Amendment
terrorism
Term with no agreed definition among governments or academic analysts, but almost invariably used in a pejorative sense, most frequently to describe life-threatening actions perpetrated by politically motivated self-appointed sub-state groups. But if such actions are carried out on behalf of a widely approved cause, say the Maquis seeking to destabilize the Government of Vichy France, then the term ‘terrorism’ is usually avoided and something more friendly is substituted. In short, one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter.
Terrorism as a pejorative term is sometimes applied, however, to the deeds of governments rather than to those of sub-state actors. The term ‘state terror’ is, for example, frequently applied to the actions of officially-appointed groups such as the Gestapo, the KGB, the Stasi of East Germany, and the like, against dissidents or ethnic minorities among their own fellow citizens. And the term ‘state-sponsored terrorism’ is often used to describe the conduct of various governments in directly organizing or indirectly assisting perpetrators of violent acts in other states. But in practice this might be said to be simply a form of low-intensity undeclared warfare among sovereign states. In recent times many countries of divergent ideological persuasion have engaged in this kind of activity while in some cases strictly condemning others for the same practices. For example, the United States during the Presidency of Ronald Reagan denounced many regimes, most notably that of Libya, in this connection while simultaneously openly sponsoring sub-state violence against Nicaragua with whose government it had full diplomatic relations. Such apparent inconsistency should not perhaps surprise us when we recall that many US dollar bills carry the portrait of a well-known perpetrator of politically motivated sub-state violence, or ‘terrorist’, or ‘freedom fighter’, namely, George Washington .
Public interest in these matters grew massively as a result of the assault by hijacked airliners on the World Trade Center in New York City and on the Pentagon in Washington D.C. on 11 September 2001. For it was now widely acknowledged that the world was a facing a so-called ‘new terrorism’ whose first clear manifestations lay only in the early 1990s. By contrast, ‘old terrorism’ had had its heyday during the 1960s and 1970s. Then the emphasis had frequently been on territorial grievances involving demands for independence from imperialists or for revision of allegedly unjust frontiers.
Sometimes such terrorism was successful — for example when the French were driven form Algeria and the British from Cyprus. On other occasions terrorists obtained compromise concessions that usually failed to resolve the dispute but nevertheless kept the level of violence contained. The Provisional Irish Republican Army and the Basque terrorists known as
Euzkadi ta Askatasuma
(ETA) come into this category. But some terrorist groups, like Baader-Meinhof in West Germany and the Red Brigades in Italy, simply failed unambiguously and so faded away: typically these were motivated by ideology rather than by ethnic or cultural identity and had a tendency to misread the amount of popular support they commanded. What all these various ‘old terrorists’ had in common, however, was that their operations tended to focus on limited geographical areas and their methods, though certainly ruthless, were not intended to maximize bloodshed without any regard to the impression given to the constituencies they claimed to represent. In short, they wanted many people watching rather then many people dead; they usually had aims that were rationally defensible; and they pursued such aims with some sense of proportionality. So-called ‘new terrorists’, on the other hand, are nihilistic, are inspired by fanatical religious beliefs, and are willing to seek martyrdom through suicide. They rarely set out aims that appear remotely attainable; they give no warnings; they do not engage in bargaining; they find compromise solutions to problems unappealing; they are willing and even eager to carry out the mass slaughter of non-combatants; and they frequently do not even claim responsibility for their deeds - presumably because they feel ultimately accountable only to a deity.
The ‘new terrorism’ was maybe first seen in 1993 when an attempt was made to bring about the collapse of the World Trade Center in New York. The desire to kill thousands was clear even though in the event relatively few casualties resulted as the basement-based bombs proved insufficiently powerful to topple a tower. The US authorities blamed Islamic extremism and eventually a number of Muslims were brought to trial for the outrage. In the next major US manifestation of the ‘new terrorism’ it was Christian Fundamentalism's turn to be involved: in 1995 168 people were killed when a US Government building in Oklahoma City was blown up — with an American White Supremacist, Timothy McVeigh , being found guilty of the attack and duly executed. Even more alarming was the use of weapons of mass destruction, both biological and chemical, in Tokyo during the early- and mid-1990s. Actual deaths amounted only to twelve as several attempts were made to spread botulism and anthrax in the streets and sarin in the subway. The desire to kill many thousands was undoubted but technological incompetence prevented a catastrophe. Those responsible were again motivated by religion — in this case that of the obscure Aum Shinriko sect.
The unambiguous emergence of a ‘new terrorism’ was finally put beyond question as a result of the attacks on the United States on 11 September 2001. Al-Qaeda, an Islamic fundamentalist network, was immediately blamed by the US Government. And, after much imprecise rhetoric about the intention to create a global coalition to wage ‘War against Terrorism’, US-led military action was taken against Afghanistan, whose Taliban-controlled regime was held to have harboured at least parts of the al-Qaeda network and, in particular, Osama Bin Laden .
DC
Terrorism as a pejorative term is sometimes applied, however, to the deeds of governments rather than to those of sub-state actors. The term ‘state terror’ is, for example, frequently applied to the actions of officially-appointed groups such as the Gestapo, the KGB, the Stasi of East Germany, and the like, against dissidents or ethnic minorities among their own fellow citizens. And the term ‘state-sponsored terrorism’ is often used to describe the conduct of various governments in directly organizing or indirectly assisting perpetrators of violent acts in other states. But in practice this might be said to be simply a form of low-intensity undeclared warfare among sovereign states. In recent times many countries of divergent ideological persuasion have engaged in this kind of activity while in some cases strictly condemning others for the same practices. For example, the United States during the Presidency of Ronald Reagan denounced many regimes, most notably that of Libya, in this connection while simultaneously openly sponsoring sub-state violence against Nicaragua with whose government it had full diplomatic relations. Such apparent inconsistency should not perhaps surprise us when we recall that many US dollar bills carry the portrait of a well-known perpetrator of politically motivated sub-state violence, or ‘terrorist’, or ‘freedom fighter’, namely, George Washington .
Public interest in these matters grew massively as a result of the assault by hijacked airliners on the World Trade Center in New York City and on the Pentagon in Washington D.C. on 11 September 2001. For it was now widely acknowledged that the world was a facing a so-called ‘new terrorism’ whose first clear manifestations lay only in the early 1990s. By contrast, ‘old terrorism’ had had its heyday during the 1960s and 1970s. Then the emphasis had frequently been on territorial grievances involving demands for independence from imperialists or for revision of allegedly unjust frontiers.
Sometimes such terrorism was successful — for example when the French were driven form Algeria and the British from Cyprus. On other occasions terrorists obtained compromise concessions that usually failed to resolve the dispute but nevertheless kept the level of violence contained. The Provisional Irish Republican Army and the Basque terrorists known as
Euzkadi ta Askatasuma
(ETA) come into this category. But some terrorist groups, like Baader-Meinhof in West Germany and the Red Brigades in Italy, simply failed unambiguously and so faded away: typically these were motivated by ideology rather than by ethnic or cultural identity and had a tendency to misread the amount of popular support they commanded. What all these various ‘old terrorists’ had in common, however, was that their operations tended to focus on limited geographical areas and their methods, though certainly ruthless, were not intended to maximize bloodshed without any regard to the impression given to the constituencies they claimed to represent. In short, they wanted many people watching rather then many people dead; they usually had aims that were rationally defensible; and they pursued such aims with some sense of proportionality. So-called ‘new terrorists’, on the other hand, are nihilistic, are inspired by fanatical religious beliefs, and are willing to seek martyrdom through suicide. They rarely set out aims that appear remotely attainable; they give no warnings; they do not engage in bargaining; they find compromise solutions to problems unappealing; they are willing and even eager to carry out the mass slaughter of non-combatants; and they frequently do not even claim responsibility for their deeds - presumably because they feel ultimately accountable only to a deity.
The ‘new terrorism’ was maybe first seen in 1993 when an attempt was made to bring about the collapse of the World Trade Center in New York. The desire to kill thousands was clear even though in the event relatively few casualties resulted as the basement-based bombs proved insufficiently powerful to topple a tower. The US authorities blamed Islamic extremism and eventually a number of Muslims were brought to trial for the outrage. In the next major US manifestation of the ‘new terrorism’ it was Christian Fundamentalism's turn to be involved: in 1995 168 people were killed when a US Government building in Oklahoma City was blown up — with an American White Supremacist, Timothy McVeigh , being found guilty of the attack and duly executed. Even more alarming was the use of weapons of mass destruction, both biological and chemical, in Tokyo during the early- and mid-1990s. Actual deaths amounted only to twelve as several attempts were made to spread botulism and anthrax in the streets and sarin in the subway. The desire to kill many thousands was undoubted but technological incompetence prevented a catastrophe. Those responsible were again motivated by religion — in this case that of the obscure Aum Shinriko sect.
The unambiguous emergence of a ‘new terrorism’ was finally put beyond question as a result of the attacks on the United States on 11 September 2001. Al-Qaeda, an Islamic fundamentalist network, was immediately blamed by the US Government. And, after much imprecise rhetoric about the intention to create a global coalition to wage ‘War against Terrorism’, US-led military action was taken against Afghanistan, whose Taliban-controlled regime was held to have harboured at least parts of the al-Qaeda network and, in particular, Osama Bin Laden .
DC
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